Executive Summary

This policy brief explores the key frameworks within criminal justice, rehabilitative and retributive justice, and their implications for society on a larger scale. It examines the historical shift from rehabilitation-centered approaches to the rise of retribution-based policies, particularly following the "Nothing Works" doctrine. The consequences of these punitive policies, including mass incarceration, racial disparities, and the erosion of human dignity, are critically analyzed.

Ultimately, I argue for a return to a rehabilitation-focused justice system, emphasizing the long-term benefits of reducing recidivism and improving offender reintegration into society. The paper discusses the economic, social, and moral justifications for such a shift, proposing that restoring offenders through rehabilitation not only reduces crime but also addresses systemic inequities that engender and exacerbate criminal behavior.

Ultimately, I find a dire need for sweeping reforms across the U.S. criminal justice system, including expanded rehabilitative programs, the elimination of mandatory minimums, and post-release support. By prioritizing human dignity and effective reintegration throughout a rehabilitative process, the justice system can better serve both offenders and society, honoring the human dignity and rights of our offenders to ensure a safer and more just nation.

Pointed Summary

• The United States is the world’s foremost incarcerator, housing 4% of the world’s population while imprisoning 20% of the world’s prisoners. 
• Outside of moral consequences, this mass incarceration results in societal and financial implications.
• The current system of retributive justice, implemented following Richard Martinson’s consequential 1971 What Works doctrine, the tough-on-crime policies of the 70s and 80s, and systems of structural violence are to blame for this pressing societal issue 
• Reforms have achieved moderate success, but mass incarceration remains a pressing issue.
• Thus, the United States should reform the criminal justice system with a rehabilitative and restorative focus to ensure utmost equity in how the nation treats its offenders. 

‍

Land of the Free: The World Leader in Mass Incarceration

The United States of America houses just above 4% of the world’s population, yet accounts for 20% of the world’s prisoners, incarcerating roughly 2.5 million individuals per year (Wamsley, 2018). 

The nation’s mass incarceration problem is self-evident—it lauds the highest incarceration rate and largest imprisoned population in the world. Of its roughly 300 million citizens, 70 million have criminal records and a history of incarceration and 2.5 million are currently in prison or jail (Karandinos and Bourgois, 2020; Muresianu, 2018). In the land of the free, mass incarceration rings true as a uniquely American phenomenon, touching almost every fact of American life. 

‍

The harms of mass incarceration are not limited to one group or category. Increasingly high rates of imprisonment devastate lives and communities, strain federal and state budgets, and exacerbate racial and economic disparities. 

‍

First, the economic implications that accompany housing the world’s largest incarcerated population are consequential. According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, the direct and total cost of the American corrections and justice system totals to just under $300 billion dollars per year (2021). However, this number fails to include the much larger societal cost that mass incarceration engenders—increased mortality and adverse health conditions, broken families, devastated communities, forgone wages, recidivism, reentry, reintegration, and far more. In fact, a study by researchers at Washington University in St. Louis estimates that quantifying this nebulous impact results in a greater societal cost of roughly $1.2 trillion, once calculations account for the devastating consequences of incarceration that continue after release (McLaughlin et al, 2016).

‍

Additionally, the impacts of mass incarceration are not spread evenly across society. Instead, the cruelest aspects of a failed experiment in deterrence and retribution are felt most heavily by the nation’s most vulnerable members—the impoverished, marginalized, minority voices which have undergone state-sanctioned oppression for the entirety of the country’s existence (Wakefield and Uggen, 2010). Black people compose a small fraction, 13%, of the U.S. majority, but account for 40% of the American prison population—a number which equals the White prison population proportion, despite the fact that White people account for 57% of the United States population (Sawyer, 2020). The majority of the prison population today is composed of members of  traditionally marginalized American communities: young minority men (Visher & Eason, 2021). Additionally, incarcerated populations predominantly consist of low-income individuals, with low-levels of education and employment access, who face mental and physical illness (Bender, 2018). Importantly, the incarceration of individuals has a sinister impact on communities—released prisoners lack the economic, educational, and social resources needed to adequately reintegrate society. When these individuals return to society, they further burden their community, which is likely already in a precarious position, further exacerbating the plight of high rate incarceration (Morenoff and Harding, 2014).  A pernicious self-perpetuating cycle reveals itself: individuals from already vulnerable communities are more likely to be incarcerated, and the high rates of incarceration render the community increasingly more vulnerable. 

‍

Without an emphasis on rehabilitation and successful societal reintegration present in our prisons, the offender reenters society facing a long barrel of odds stacked heavily against their prosperity and success. In our current system, prisoners re-enter civilian life unprepared for the hurdles which await them—they often lack education, job training, housing, readily available employment, and other resources which make diversion from crime possible (Ortiz, 2019).

‍

Thus, the systemic failure to provide resources and programs to combat the structures which prevent offender reintegration explain the high rates of recidivism that follow incarceration—the fact that marginalized place of released prisoners is continually reinforced by the structural issues of reentry explain why three-fourths of the formerly incarcerated are rearrested within three years of their release (Goger et al., 2021). 

‍

When we fail to supply our prisoners with the needed resources to succeed, we encourage a future of criminality. In other words, when we set up our citizens to fail, we thus lack no moral grounding to be angry at their failure.

‍

And the costs of the high rates of recidivism extend beyond just the reincarceration of the individual offender. Increasing rates of criminality takes money and resources away from communities, harms the 2.7 million children of the incarcerated individuals (with impacts ranging from unstable family environments to stress-induced mental illness), and reinforce the individual’s marginalization in society (Bender, 2018)   As Zoukis most aptly notes: “recidivism…crushes the lives of prisons and their families, burdens American taxpayers…creates harmful and hostile prison environments…and creates new victims of crime as each new ex-prisoner becomes a recidivist” (2014). 

‍

Thus, across the complexity of state, federal, and local criminal justice legislation, one can see a clear pattern emerge: a failure to respect the human dignity offenders, a failure to adequately address the criminogenic causes of crime, and the perpetuation of a cycle of oppression which burdens American society collectively. 

Tried Policy and Current Stances

Prior to the late 20th century, rehabilitation served as the objective of the US criminal justice system. The purpose of state-sanctioned deprivation of rights and freedoms was thus rehabilitation—the restoration of the criminal to his original place in society prior to the crime (Phelps, 2013). In fact, until the 1970s Nothing Works Doctrine, rehabilitation remained the primary goal of the justice system (Atkinson, 2018). The lofty goal of offender restoration was a byproduct of multiple cultural moments. The advent of the Civil Rights Movement, Roosevelt’s enduring legacy of big government, and revolutionary psychological research ushered in an era in which society—not the offender—and its conditions were considered to be criminal. Thus, the system targeted the root causes of crime while simultaneously maintaining the importance of rehabilitation, reentry, and preservation of human dignity (DiIulio, Jr., 1993). 

‍

But the late 20th century experienced a stunning policy reversal: the publication of Robert Martinson’s sociology paper “What Works? Questions and Answers About Prison Reform” marked the inflection point between a rehabilitative and retributive criminal justice system (Davidson, 2022). In his research, Martinson, an influential sociologist, concluded that rehabilitation lacked empirical backing. The response to the question of  “what works” in terms of prisoner rehabilitation, the response was clear: nothing works. Prisoners were thus presumed to be inevitably incorrigible, challenging a century of American philosophy and criminological precedence (Hollin, 2004). This report, combined with rising crime rates and the growing post-Civil-Rights-Era sentiment that crime was an growing existential threat, led to the consequential abandonment of rehabilitation as a policy objective and the adoption of new forms of justice which prioritized retribution, incapacitation, and deterrence (Western, 2007). 

‍

Rehabilitation—once the utmost objective of the US corrections system—was disregarded as a lofty and impossible notion that unintentionally endangered American citizens by allowing unrehabilitated offenders to reenter society undeterred from criminal life (Kirchmeier, 2004). Prisons, now unfettered by the restraints of rehabilitation, gained new objectives: incapacitation, retribution, and deterrence (Oleson, 2002). And thus, the era of punitive excess began, marking a redefinition of the American criminal justice paradigm that would span from the late sixties and seventies into today (Travis & Western, 2021).

‍

In 1968, President Richard Nixon declared his infamous “War on Drugs”. His efforts, intended to hamper drug consumption, use, and addiction in the states, left a long legacy of punitive policies which imposed dramatic and enduring consequences for non-violent offenses (Coyne and Hall, 2017). His administration heralded the creation of the Drug Enforcement Agency, greater criminalization of substances, stricter penalties,   mandatory minimums, and other reforms intended to deter American drug use. The passage of the Comprehensive Substance Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act ushered in a new drug forfeiture regime that allowed law enforcement to seize cash and property, and thus lucratively incentivized law enforcement agencies to further pursue, convict, and charge drug-related offenders (Alexander, 2011). The shift away from rehabilitation underscored each and every one of these policies—because drug addicts and consumers could be neither rehabilitated nor cured, strict and punitive sanctions on consumption, possession, and distribution logically remained as the only option to hamper the wide proliferation of unregulated drug use. 

‍

The succeeding “tough-on-crime” candidates upheld a similar unraveling of rehabilitative criminal justice—the Reagan, Clinton, and Bush administrations all enacted a series of legislative hurdles which widened the criminal justice system, raised sentencing requirements, and unintentionally led to the proliferation of citizens in jails and prisons across America (Hodge & Dholakia, 2021). 

‍

The 1984 Comprehensive Crime Control and Safe Streets Act abolished parole from federal systems, preventing prisoners from earning time off their sentences through improved behavior (Kantor et al., 2017). States soon followed suit. Parole, which before allowed incarcerated individuals to reduce time served through proactive behavior, was abolished and replaced with “truth-in-sentencing”, a new policy which set high quotas for the amount of time served and barred inmates from reducing their sentence past a certain threshold (Andrews & Bonta, 2016). 

‍

The tough-on-crime approach culminated in the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994, the largest crime bill in American history. Although the bill included many investments in and reforms for the criminal justice system, its provisions were also influential in the perpetuation of mass incarceration. It created the Violent Offender Incarceration and Truth-in-Sentencing Incentive Grants Program, which appropriated $12.5 billion  for state funding for incarceration (Einsen, 2019). Importantly, 50% of that 12.5 billion was specifically reserved for states that had enacted the “truth-in-sentencing laws”, thus incentivizing states to abandon parole practices for stricter sentencing and serving requirements. 

‍

Stricter sentencing practices were also reflected  in new “three-strikes-and-out” legislation, which imposed longer prison sentences upon each “strike” or serious/violent felony conviction. Upon the third strike, the offender’s new sentence for any new felony conviction is life imprisonment (Legislative Analyst's Office, 2005). In between 1994 and 1995, 24 of the 50 states passed “three strikes” laws, stipulating longer and stricter sentencing requirements for habitual offenders, aiming to deter released individuals from reoffending (Marvell & Moody, 2015).  This era of American criminal policy also witnessed the introduction of a new crime-deterring tool: mandatory minimums—or a mandatory amount of time judges must give upon sentencing for a specific crime. The 1986 passage of the Anti-Drug Abuse Act during the Reagan administration introduced new federal mandatory minimums for drug-related offenses (Beaver, 2010). The act created severe consequences for previously non-violent offenses, instituting a new punitive approach that supplanted the state’s previous rehabilitative-focused system (Keyes et al., 2022). 

‍

Instead of deterring crime and protecting public safety, the advent of the punitive era wreaked havoc on American society. The rate of incarceration increased 500% across three decades due to a series of factors, but primarily because of the repudiation of rehabilitation as a criminological goal (Western, 2007). Truth-in-sentencing and mandatory minimums skyrocketed prison populations, increased rates of violent infractions, and raised the probability of the offender’s return to prison (Macdonald, 2024; Lamb, 2015). Mandatory minimums are also responsible for racial disparities in sentencing, with Black people being sentenced to 10 percent longer terms than White people charged with the same crime. Simultaneously, these policies failed completely (Rehavi & Starr, 2014). Crime remained undeterred (National Research Council, 2014). Three-strikes-laws laws, which lack any support the fact that longer prison sentences reduce recidivism, impose disproportionate costs to violent offenses, resulting in a prohibitive cost for the state and an ambiguous social cost (Doob & Webster, 2012; Iyengar, 2008). Even if deterrence was somewhat achieved by imposing a severer set of consequences, three-strikes has also been found responsible for a 23-29% increase in homicides (3,300 additional homicides per annum) as offenders take more dramatic measures to avoid a third offense and “out” (Marvell and Moody, 2015). 

‍

Today, the detrimental impacts of the Nothing Works Doctrine are evident in the aberrations of the criminal justice system. The retributive and deterrent models of punishment—exercised extensively throughout the 1970s till today—have objectively failed. The overwhelming pressure to sentence, punish, and incarcerate without relent or understanding has unequivocally devastated American society. Prisons, in their current state, are criminogenic institutions, where inmates leave financially, emotionally, and educationally unprepared for society (Petrich et al., 2021). 

‍

But the failure of tough-on-crime policies have long been recognized by policymakers across the political aisle (Eisen & Chettiar, 2015) . The end of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st century witnessed a paradigm shift as policymakers and stakeholders alike realized the sinister legacy that the punitive policies of the war on crime and drugs left behind: an ever-swelling prison population which strained budgets across all levels of government and left disproportionate impacts upon marginalized and low-income minority communities. 

‍

The Obama Administration ushered in the era of smart-on-crime, a term popularized by Vice President Harris. The philosophy sought to strike an important median between leniency and severity by focusing resources, addressing racial and socioeconomic disparities,  alleviating punishments for nonviolent offenses, and investing in preventative and recidivism-reduction efforts (Chung, 2017). Reforms, across all levels of federalism, began to trickle-in as policymakers attempted to address the uniquely American issue of mass incarceration. Since 2007, more than thirty states have pursued reforms that reduce punitive sentencing restrictions and invest in justice alternatives outside of traditional incarceration (The Pew Charitable Trusts, 2017). Similar progress has also occurred on the federal level. In the past two decades, sentencing reform has seen a slew of acts which aim to mitigate the impact of mandatory minimums and re-enforce judicial discretion (). The Justice Safety Valve Act of 2013 and the Fair Sentencing Act of 2010, for example, both worked to reduce mandatory minimums, allow for sentencing below the mandated penalties in specific cases, and re empower judges to make their decisions based on the specificity of the case, not the generality of the rule (Wing, 2013; US Sentencing Commission, 2015). 

‍

Work has also been done to address prisoner reentry: the 2007 Second Chance Act worked to improve reentry and reintegration via establishment of a federal grant program, but failed to deliver significant enough funding to help aid in the process of prisoner resocialization (Miller, 2014). 

‍

 The 2018 passage of the First Step Act, one of the most comprehensive pieces of justice reform of the century, can be seen as the culmination of this decades-long attempt to address the injurious legacy tough-on-crime left on the justice system (Lau, 2018). The act also shortened mandatory minimums for drug offenses, expanded in-prison opportunities for rehabilitation and education, created earned time credits, and invested in bettering prison conditions (Nellis & Komar, 2023). 

‍

Another important policy consideration is international—the case of Norway’s carceral state. Norway today boasts the lowest recidivism rate of Western nations: only twenty percent of all prisoners recidivate and reoffend (Denny, 2016). However, it wasn’t always this way. During the 90s, Norway faced similar rates of recidivism (~70% of all incarcerated individuals) as the United States. However, this is where the countries’ paths diverge—unlike the states, the Norwegian government embarked on a revolution, overthrowing the traditional system of Western punishment and justice for a new system centered on rehabilitation and societal reintegration. The preservation of normalcy became sacred, resources became abundant, education became ample, and offenders rehabilitated (Bleicher, 2021). Ultimately, the Norway model epitomizes the importance of rehabilitation as a criminal justice imperative.

‍

 Importantly, these reforms provide the exigency for further, sweeping work  that expands upon the work of previous efforts to address the problem of mass incarceration in this nation. Despite impressive work on sentencing, American prisons still house 2.2 million people, still deprive 2.7 million children of their parents, still annually return 600,000 people to society (of which ¾ will reoffend and be re-arrested within three years of release), and still perpetuate a cycle of injustice, discrimination, and subjugation that marginalizes our most vulnerable communities (Obama, 2017). In other words, much work is still to be done. 

‍

Policy Problem

A. Stakeholders

In the push for criminal justice reform, several key stakeholders play crucial roles across the complex system of justice, especially in the context of rehabilitation (Obama, 2017). The most involved in the criminal justice process—law enforcement agencies, prosecutors, and defense attorneys—are inextricably affected by reforms which transform our understanding of the justice system and policies which shift our treatment and sentencing of offenders. Although the discussion of criminal justice system reform involves almost every actor in American life, this brief’s discussion is limited to the impacts and importance of mass incarceration on and to prisoners, communities, families, and American society as a whole. 

Prisoners themselves are also exigent stakeholders. First, the mass incarceration of individuals across the United States has engendered a significant degradation of prison conditions across the nation (Gaes, 1985) . As prison populations continue to swell on limited state and federal budgets, prisons become overcrowded,  already scarce resources become increasingly strained, and conditions deteriorate (Andrews & Bonta, 2010). Overcrowding results in a series of deleterious health and safety impacts—violence, now harder to supervise, goes up within the prison, mental illnesses lack the adequate treatment and professionals, infectious diseases spread, and prisoners endure conditions of violence, deprivation, and hardship which further endanger their emotional and physical health and  return to society (Hopwood, 2021). This is exacerbated by the abject  failure of the United States criminal justice system to provide adequate rehabilitative opportunities, which engender the high recidivism rates that trap individuals into a lifetime of criminal offense and incarceration (). In other words, mass incarceration makes escaping from the cycle of offense harder. 

‍

The families and communities of incarcerated individuals also represent an important voice in the reform discussion. 2.7 million children  nationwide currently have an imprisoned parent and over 5 million children have had an imprisoned parent at one point in their lives (). The loss of one or more parents to incarceration wreaks indelible havoc on family stability, mental health, educational attainment, avoidance of crime, and economic success in important developmental years (Hayes, 2020; Elhage, 2016). Thus, it is no surprise that 10% of children with an incarcerated parent fail to finish high school, instead opting; that these children are at much higher risk for mental illness, substance abuse, developmental delays and academic difficulties; and are five times more likely to be incarcerated themselves (Hayes, 2020;  Anderson & Olson, 2019). Importantly, this familial impact is not spread evenly throughout society. Instead, Black and Hispanic children are 7.5 and 2.3 times more likely, respectively, to have had an incarcerated parent than their white peers (Glaze & Maruschak, 2010). 

‍

The impact of incarceration on communities is similarly concentrated among the most disadvantaged in society: the communities with the highest rates of incarcerated individuals are the minority communities who face high levels of poverty, unemployment, and crime (Morenoff and Harding, 2014). And mass incarceration further harms these communities:  the removal of potentially productive members of society results in loss of work, less taxes, and a weakened local economy (McInerney, 2020). Importantly, studies have also found a correlation between rates of prisoner release and higher levels of crime (Hipp & Yates 2009). Even once individuals are returned to their communities, the impacts of incarceration endure. History of imprisonment and criminal records are empirically proven to decrease wages, decrease the ability to find and maintain employment, and dramatically increase the likelihood of extended unemployment (Pettit and Guterrez, 2018). Additionally, research theorizes that the cyclical relationship between individuals of disadvantaged communities and the criminal justice system  engenders a phenomenon of “coercive mobility”, where high rates of incarceration yield higher crime rates and trigger a self-perpetuating cycle that increases both crime and imprisonment, thus trapping neighborhoods in a cycle of increasing marginalization (Clear, 2007). 

‍

And lastly, American society as a whole holds stake in this matter. Crime, incarceration, and the social cost of the prison-industrial-complex bears weight across all three hundred million American citizens. Thus, improving the system of criminal justice and incarceration in this country ought to be of high priority to anyone inhabiting its borders. 

‍

B. Nonpartisan Reasoning

Recidivism affects all members of society—the impact of crime in society extends beyond partisan lines. The societal cost of incarceration and the failure to rehabilitate offenders affects every single American citizen, regardless of party affiliation. 

‍

Additionally, criminal justice reform is an issue that enjoys bipartisan support. In fact, 78% of likely voters support criminal justice reform. When the polling is calculated along party lines, the bipartisan theme of criminal justice reform continues: two in three Republicans, nine in ten Democrats, and eight in ten independents all believe that the current state of criminal justice in the United States warrants reform (BSG/FWD.us, 2024)

‍

Importantly, this bipartisan support for reform extends overwhelmingly to support for decreasing the size of the incarceration system and implementing rehabilitation focused reforms. According to 2016 polls conducted by the Justice Action Network (by the Tarrance Group), nearly 70% of voters nationwide believe that government spending on incarcerating non-violent offenders is excessive and that federal prisons incarcerate too many non-violent criminals (Justice Action Network, n.d.). 2022 polls by Benenson Strategy Group and Public Opinion Strategies revealed that 69% of voters nationwide support eliminating mandatory minimums and that 81% of voters support allowing people in prison earning time off through rehabilitation and adherence to prison rules, thus rejecting truth-in-sentencing legislation (BSG/FWD.us, 2022). 

‍

Additional polling by the Justice Action Network (JAN) in 2018 discovered that 85% of Americans believe that rehabilitation ought to supplant punishment as the goal of the criminal justice system. The same 2018 poll, also revealed that 62% of Americans believe that incarceration does not improve their quality of life (Vera Institute, 2018). 

‍

The bipartisan consensus of the American people is self-evident: criminal justice reform is needed and ought to prioritize rehabilitative and restorative goals. 

‍

This consensus across the political aisle  on the criminal justice system is echoed by partisan leaders. 

‍

Policy Options

‍

The justification for implementing rehabilitation as the object of the criminal justice system is two-fold—the dignity of the prisoner and the benefit to the community. 

Punishment and discussions of justice are inextricably linked to philosophical inquiries about ethics, governance, and human rights. What is just in terms of punishment? How do we know if punishment is just? 

I argue that the primacy of human dignity is paramount to achieving justice throughout government

In fact, human dignity’s primacy over justice is even recognized by the Supreme Court, with the court stating that “prisoners may be deprived of rights that are fundamental liberty,” but cannot be stripped of “the essence of human dignity” that inheres “in all persons” (Brown, et al. v. Plata, et al., 563 U.S. 493, 2011). 

‍

And this primacy of human dignity yields a criminal justice system modeled around the primacy of rehabilitation. An inextricable part of human dignity and humanity is the capability for change—for growth, autonomy, and discipline (Ploch, 2010). Thus, rehabilitation provides the utmost respect to this dignity, recognizing the offender’s capacity for change and growth. This model of justice no longer defines the offender by their offense, but by their inherent value as humans who possess an inviolable degree of dignity Rehabilitation is thus justified on the pure ground of human dignity and respect for the rights derived from dignity’s existence. Rehabilitation no longer instrumentalizes the offender, but instead views them in the full scope of their humanity, acknowledging the unique human capacity for change (Rotman, 1987). Imprisonment without opportunity for rehabilitation fundamentally infringes on the dignity and liberties of the offender. If we knowingly enter humans into a place we know breeds crime, distress, and more without the opportunity to counteract those negative effects, we commit a significant violation of their dignity and autonomy (Rotman, 1987).

Retributive justice and incapacitation focused models of prison thus fail the offender in terms of his dignity. The very notion of retributive justice—the idea that punishment ought to be proportional to the crime—is predicated upon a preliminary egalitarian ordering of society. Thus, this formulation of justice is predicated upon the notion that society itself is just. But in reality, retributive justice reveals itself as unjust once considerations to the criminogenic bindings inherent in a society built on centuries of race, class, and gender-based oppression  (Duff and Green, 2011). As Vitellio, 1991 so succinctly asks, “how can it be justice to punish as a crime that which the institutions of society render unavoidable?” 

Programs which hold incapacitation and deterrence as their policy objectives also routinely fail to achieve their initial goal. In fact, the effect of incapacitation – protecting a society by removing an offender (a presumed threat) from society — declines as the incarceration rate rises (Raphael and Stoll, 2014). Additionally, this philosophy of sentencing, which is exemplified by the three-strikes-doctrine, yields inequitable and disparate results. For example, in California, a three-strike-state, Black people compose just 7% of the state’s general population, but account for 44% of the “three striker population” (Barton, 2010). The “replacement effect” also explains Deterrence fails in a similar fashion.  A meta-analysis of 116 studies finds that deterrence-based sentencing paradigms routinely  make no impact on reoffending and even slightly increase rates of recidivism (Petrich et al., 2021). Additionally, the notion that strict sentencing will scare people away from crime, which underscored a large proportion of the Nixon and Reagan-era policies, also fails in practice, as people both don’t conceptualize the existing penalties for crime and don’t expect to be caught and charged for their crime (National Institute of Justice, 2016) . 

‍

I therefore argue that on both a deontological and  consequential level, rehabilitation prevails as the preeminent model of criminal justice. Rehabilitation, by reducing recidivism and thus reducing the overall costs of the criminal justice system, is the best system for achieving the maximal social utility, defined here as reduced recidivism and reduced social costs on the citizen (Soderland, 2023). Although Martinson’s Nothing Works doctrine made rehabilitation temporarily infamous for its inefficacy, empirical evidence has since routinely disproven Martinson’s thesis that nothing works in terms of rehabilitation (a thesis which Martinson himself would later reverse) (Martinson, 1979). A 2007 systematic review of studies that examined the effectiveness of rehabilitative programs on offender recidivism found that rates of reoffense were reduced, on average, by twenty to forty percent (Lipsey and Cullen, 2007). These numbers, when combined with the rates of recidivism, reveal that effective rehabilitation in prisons and post-release could reduce the number of people who reoffend by roughly 100,000 (Petersilia, 2011). 

‍

The benefit of this reduced recidivism cannot be overstated. As aforementioned, recidivism affects every single American citizen—whether it be increased taxes to pay for an increasingly large corrections system, victimization, incarceration or knowing someone who is in the criminal justice system—in an unavoidable fashion. Imporeductions in recidivism yield benefits for every citizen. All can enjoy the economic benefits of implementing a rehabilitative system—reports find that investments in recidivism-reducing programs return $1.47 to $5.27 for every dollar spent on reform (Council of Economic Advisors, 2018).  Imprisonments based on supervision violations and revocations alone (thus not including reoffense) cost states a collective $8 billion in a single fiscal year (Clement & Saunders, 2023).  Although rehabilitative-based reforms may be initially costly, reducing the amount of reoffense, reincarceration, fostering productive members of society and participating members of the economy, and decreasing the size of the carceral state all result in rehabilitation being increasingly more cost-effective and inexpensive in the long run (Bandyopany, 20; Dahl, 20). Reducing rates of reoffense also improves public safety by reducing the number of offenders, prevents new victimization of innocent individuals, and promotes social justice by working to break individuals out of the cycle of criminality. 

‍

Acknowledging this, the United States ought to thus shift from a model of criminal justice system centered on retribution and incapacitation to one focused on rehabilitation to best maximize social utility and honor the dignity of our incarcerated individuals, victims, and community members.

Conclusions and Recommendations

Retribution and incapacitation in the United States have been a self-evident failure. Rehabilitative and restorative justice models prevail as a clear and important alternative to the models of justice which have engendered the greatest mass incarceration crisis in the history of our nation. 

To achieve this paradigm shift in criminal justice, policymakers must implement a series of sweeping reforms to rehabilitate the criminal justice system itself. 

First, I recommend the extensive expansion of rehabilitative programs in prisons nationwide. Rehabilitation is not a one-size-fits-all endeavor, thus the implementation of a diversity of evidence-based recidivism reduction programs would work to both return our offenders to a productive place in society, address societal inequities (lack of education, for example) and criminogenic conditions that engender crime, and improve public safety. Manifestations of these empirical rehabilitation programs include, but are not limited to: 

• Educational access programs in prisons. These carceral-based educational programs reduce recidivism by 43% while increasing the odds of post-release employment by 13% (Davis et al., 2013). 
• Substance abuse treatment programs, which reduce drug use by half while reducing crime and arrests by up to 805% and 64%, respectively (Peters, 2007). 
• In-prison behavioral health services, which help address the fact that roughly 63% of individuals with a history of mental health issues do not receive treatment during incarceration (Bureau of Justice Assistance, n.d.). In fact, the provision of cognitive-behavioral programs have been proven to reduce recidivism and address root criminogenic causes (Hansen, 2008 )

‍

Second, I suggest the expansion of federal funding of rehabilitative programs in prisons. On a federal level. Such investments may manifest in funding programs like the Residential Substance Abuse Treatment (RSAT) Program, a grant program that provides funding to state, local, and tribal governments to provide treatment for substance use disorders during detention or incarceration (Bureau of Justice Assistance, n.d.). The impact of this grant program, on a state-level, demonstrates the unharnessed potential for further investment into incarceral—in just Arizona, the RSAT program yielded a significant 3-year ROI of 4.7 pillion per 235 treated graduates (Zobel & Ratner, 2024). Seeing the beneficial impact of investment in rehabilitation, I suggest piloting other federal funding programs for other incarceration-based rehabilitation: correctional education, jobs training, and therapy.

To address the legislative factors which engender mass incarceration, I also call for the complete elimination of truth-in-sentencing and mandatory minimum statutes. Not only do these punitive measures objectively fail to ever garner public support—they have engendered the mass incarceration of tens of millions while objectively failing their policy objective of deterrence (Nellis, 2024). Models of elimination for mandatory minimums for drug offenses can be found in almost half of all American states, but work remains to be done in terms of continuity and consistency across the nation and reform on non-drug-related offenses (Craigie & Zapryanova, 2021)

Lastly, I suggest the expansion of post-release support for formerly incarcerated individuals. Successful reintegration is not only a significant determinant for recidivism but a right of each individual to be successfully restored to a productive place in society. A two-pronged approach that partners both governmental and community-based organizations best facilitates successful offender reentry. Policymakers ought to thus invest in both the creation of government programs which address risk factors affecting offender reentry, while simultaneously creating grant systems that provide funding for community-based centers uniquely equipped to address the specific needs of a community, offender, and case (Price-Tucker et al., 2019).

Acknowledgment

The Institute for Youth in Policy wishes to acknowledge Paul Kramer, Carlos Bindert, Gwen Singer, and other contributors for developing and maintaining the Programming Department within the Institute.

References (Should Also Be Hyperlinked)

1. 179. (2019). Historic Criminal Justice Reforms Begin to Take Effect. Brennan Center for Justice; New York University of Law. https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/historic-criminal-justice-reforms-begin-take-effect 
2. Alexander, M. (2020). The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration In the Age of Colorblindness. New Press. (Original work published 2010)
3. Andrews, D. A., & Bonta, J. (2010). Rehabilitating Criminal Justice Policy and practice. Psychology, Public Policy, and Law, 16(1), 39–55. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0018362 
4. Atkinson, D. V. (2018, February 27). A Revolution of Values in the U.S. Criminal Justice System. Center for American Progress. https://www.americanprogress.org/article/revolution-values-u-s-criminal-justice-system/ 
5. Bandyopadhyay, S. (2020, March 24). Why rehabilitation – not harsher prison sentences – makes economic sense. The Conversation; The Conversation. https://theconversation.com/why-rehabilitation-not-harsher-prison-sentences-makes-economic-sense-132213 
6. Barack Obama. (2017). The President’s Role in Advancing Criminal Justice Reform - Harvard Law Review. Harvard Law Review, 130(3). https://harvardlawreview.org/print/vol-130/the-presidents-role-in-advancing-criminal-justice-reform/#footnote-ref-41 
7. Barton, A. (2011). INCAPACITATION THEORY (p. 463). https://marisluste.files.wordpress.com/2010/11/incapacitation-theory.pdf 
8. Beaver, A. (1986). Part of the Law Commons Recommended Citation Recommended Citation Alyssa L. Beaver, Getting a Fix on Cocaine Sentencing Policy: Reforming the Sentencing Scheme of the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of. In 78 Fordham L. Rev (p. 2531). https://ir.lawnet.fordham.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4535&context=flr 
9. Bender, K. (2018, March 2). Education Opportunities in Prison Are Key to Reducing Crime. Center for American Progress. https://www.americanprogress.org/article/education-opportunities-prison-key-reducing-crime/ 
10. Bleicher, A. (2021). Norway’s Humane Approach to Prisons Can Work Here Too | UCSF Magazine. Magazine.ucsf.edu; University of California San Francisco. https://magazine.ucsf.edu/norways-humane-approach-prisons-can-work-here-too#:~:text=That%20changed%20in%20the%201990s 
11. Brown, et al. v. Plata, et al., 563 U.S. 493 (2011), Justia Law ___. Retrieved September 11, 2024, from https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/563/09-1233/ 
12. Bureau of Justice Statistics. (2022). Bureau of Justice Statistics. Bureau of Justice Statistics; Department of Justice. https://bjs.ojp.gov/ 
13. Chung, E. (2017, May 12). Smart on Crime: An Alternative to the Tough vs. Soft Debate. Center for American Progress. https://www.americanprogress.org/article/smart-crime-alternative-tough-vs-soft-debate/    
14. Clear, T. (2007). Imprisoning Communities. Oxford University Press.
15. Clement, M., & Saunders, J. (2023). The Cost of Recidivism. Justice Center.
16. Council of Economic Advisors. (2018). Return on Investments in Recidivism-reducing Programs. Executive Office of the President of the United States. https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/Returns-on-Investments-in-Recidivism-Reducing-Programs.pdf 
17. Coyne, C., & Hall, A. (2017, April 12). Four Decades and Counting: the Continued Failure of the War on Drugs. Cato Institute; Cato Institute. https://www.cato.org/policy-analysis/four-decades-counting-continued-failure-war-drugs 
18. Craigie, T., & Zapryanova, M. (2021). Mandatory Minimum Reforms, Sentencing, And Racial-ethnic Mandatory Minimum Reforms, Sentencing, And Racial-ethnic Disparities Disparities. Smith College. https://scholarworks.smith.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1067&context=eco_facpubs 
19. Dahl, G. B., & Mogstad, M. (2020, April 6). The Benefits of Rehabilitative Incarceration. National Bureau of Economic Research. https://www.nber.org/reporter/2020number1/benefits-rehabilitative-incarceration 
20. DAVIDSON, S. (2022, October 28). Preventing Crime Through Rehabilitation | ACE. The Alliance for Citizen Engagement. https://ace-usa.org/blog/research/research-criminaljustice/preventing-crime-through-rehabilitation/ 
21. Davis, L. M., Bozick, R., Steele, J. L., Saunders, J., & Jeremy, M. (2013). Evaluating the Effectiveness of Correctional Education. Rand.org; RAND Corporation. https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RR266.html
22. Denny, M. (2016). Norway’s Prison System: Investigating Recidivism and Norway’s Prison System: Investigating Recidivism and Reintegration Reintegration. Journal of Student Research, 10(10). https://digitalcommons.coastal.edu/bridges/vol10/iss10/2/ 
23. Diiulio, J., Geoffrey, P., Alpert, M., Moore, G., Cole, J., Petersilia, C., Logan, J., & Wilson. (1993). Performance Measures for the Criminal Justice System Discussion Papers from the BJS-Princeton Project by. In Bureau of Justice Statistics. U.S. Department of Justice. https://bjs.ojp.gov/content/pub/pdf/pmcjs.pdf 
24. Duff, A., & Green, S. P. (2011). Philosophical foundations of criminal law. Oxford University Press.
25. Eisen, L.-B. (2019, September 9). The 1994 Crime Bill and Beyond: How Federal Funding Shapes the Criminal Justice System. Brennan Center for Justice. https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/1994-crime-bill-and-beyond-how-federal-funding-shapes-criminal-justice 
26. Eisen, L.-B., & Chettiar, I. (2015). THE RE VERSE MASS INCARCERATION ACT. Brennan Center for Justice. https://www.brennancenter.org/sites/default/files/publications/The_Reverse_Mass_Incarceration_Act%20.pdf 
27. FWD.us. (2024, March 6). New Polling Demonstrates Ongoing Support for Criminal Justice Reform. FWD.us. https://www.fwd.us/news/new-2024-polling-demonstrates-ongoing-support-for-criminal-justice-reform/ 
28. FWD.us. (2022, October 24). With the Midterm Elections Fast Approaching, New Public Opinion Research From Leading Republican and Democratic Polling Firms Shows Overwhelming Bipartisan Support for Criminal Justice Reforms to Reduce Incarceration. FWD.us. https://www.fwd.us/news/2022-criminal-justice-poll-statement/ 
29. Gaes, G. G. (1985). The Effects of Overcrowding in Prison. Crime and Justice, 6(6), 95–146. https://doi.org/10.1086/449105 
30. Glaze, L., & Maruschak, L. (2008). Parents in Prison and Their Minor Children. Bureau of Justice Statistics. Office of Justice Programs. https://bjs.ojp.gov/content/pub/pdf/pptmc.pdf 
31. Goger, A., Harding, D. J., & Henderson, H. (2021). Rethinking Prisoner Reentry. Contexts, 20(4), 46–51. https://doi.org/10.1177/15365042211060738 
32. Hayes, T. (2020, July 16). The Economic Costs of the U.S. Criminal Justice System. American Action Forum. https://www.americanactionforum.org/research/the-economic-costs-of-the-u-s-criminal-justice-system/ 
33. HIPP, J. R., & YATES, D. K. (2009). DO RETURNING PAROLEES AFFECT NEIGHBORHOOD CRIME? A CASE STUDY OF SACRAMENTO. Criminology, 47(3), 619–656. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1745-9125.2009.00166.x 
34. Hodge, J., & Dholakia, N. (2021, June 17). Fifty Years Ago Today, President Nixon Declared the War on Drugs. Vera Institute of Justice. https://www.vera.org/news/fifty-years-ago-today-president-nixon-declared-the-war-on-drugs 
35. Hollin, C. (2004). To Treat or Not to Treat? An Historical Perspective.
36. Hopwood, S. (2021, August 23). How Atrocious Prisons Conditions Make Us All Less Safe | Brennan Center for Justice. Brennan Center for Justice; New York University of Law. https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/how-atrocious-prisons-conditions-make-us-all-less-safe?fbclid=IwAR1iYHEGR89qRQ_X8OyfgpjVojDAAJVVNuM8IxwmzTWZ LkvfNrxQH4rvEgs
37. ElHage, Alysse (2016). The Complicated Problems of Children with Incarcerated Parents. Institute for Family Studies. https://ifstudies.org/blog/the-complicated-problems-of-children-with-incarcerated-parents 
38. Iyengar, R., Autor, D., Farber, H., Katz, L., Kahn, L., Kling, J., Levitt, S., Mas, A., & Rouse, C. (2008). NBER WORKING PAPER SERIES I’D RATHER BE HANGED FOR A SHEEP THAN A LAMB: THE UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES OF “THREE-STRIKES” LAWS. National Bureau of Economic Research. https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w13784/w13784.pdf 
39. Justice Action Network (JAN). (2016, January 25). Justice Action Network. Justice Action Network. https://www.justiceactionnetwork.org/news/new-poll-voters-in-key-election-states-overwhelmingly-agree-criminal-justice-system-is-broken-strongly-support-federal-reforms 

‍

40. Kantor, S., Kitchens, C., & Pawlowski, S. (2017, September 1). Civil Asset Forfeiture, Crime, and Police Incentives: Evidence from the Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984. National Bureau of Economic Research. https://www.nber.org/papers/w23873 
41. Karandinos, G., & Bourgois, P. (2019). The Structural Violence of Hyperincarceration — A 44-Year-Old Man with Back Pain. New England Journal of Medicine, 380(3), 205–209. https://doi.org/10.1056/nejmp1811542
42. Kirchmeier, J. L. (2004). A Tear in the Eye of the Law: Mitigating Factors and the Progression Toward a Disease Theory of Criminal Justice. Oregon Law Review, 83(2). https://doi.org/0196-2043

‍

43. Keyes, L., Bing, R., & Keyes, V. (2021). America’s Anti-Drug Abuse Act, the Disproportionality of Drug Laws on Blacks: A Policy Analysis. Justice Policy Journal, 18(2). https://www.cjcj.org/media/import/documents/anti-drug_abuse_keyes_et.al.pdf 
44. Lamb, M. (2015). A Return To Rehabilitation: Mandatory Minimum Sentencing in an Era Of Mass Incaraceration. Journal of Legislation, 41, 7–29. https://scholarship.law.nd.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1638&context=jleg 
45. Larrabee Sonderlund, A., Charifson, M., Ortiz, R., Khan, M., Schoenthaler, A., & Williams, N. J. (2022). A comprehensive framework for operationalizing structural racism in health research: The association between mass incarceration of Black people in the U.S. and adverse birth outcomes. SSM - Population Health, 19, 101225.  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ssmph.2022.101225 
46. Legislative Analyst's Office. (2005). A Primer: Three Strikes - The Impact After More Than a Decade. In Legislative Analyst’s Office. California Government. https://lao.ca.gov/2005/3_strikes/3_strikes_102005.htm#:~:text=Specifically%2C%20the%20Three%20Strikes%20law,Amendment%20protection%20against%20cruel%20and 
47. Lipsey, M. W., & Cullen, F. T. (2007). The Effectiveness of Correctional Rehabilitation: A Review of Systematic Reviews. Annual Review of Law and Social Science, 3(1), 297–320. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.lawsocsci.3.081806.112833 
48. Macdonald, D. (2024). Truth in Sentencing, Incentives and Recidivism. Social Science Research Network. https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4806765 
49. Martinson, R. (1979). New Findings, New Views: A Note of Caution Regarding Sentencing Reform. Hofstra Law Review, 7(2). https://scholarlycommons.law.hofstra.edu/hlr/vol7/iss2/1/ 
50. Marvell, T. B., & Moody, C. E. (2001). The Lethal Effects of Three‐Strikes Law. The Journal of Legal Studies, 30(1). https://doi.org/10.1086/468112 
51. McLaughlin, M., Pettus-Davis, C., Brown, D., Veeh, C., & Renn, T. (2016). The Economic Burden of Incarceration in the U.S. Concordance Institute for Advancing Social Justice, Working Paper #CI072016.
52. Miller, R. J. (2014). Devolving the carceral state: Race, prisoner reentry, and the micro-politics of urban poverty management. Punishment & Society, 16(3), 305–335. https://doi.org/10.1177/1462474514527487 
53. Morenoff, J. D., & Harding, D. J. (2014). Incarceration, Prisoner Reentry, and Communities. Annual Review of Sociology, 40(1), 411–429. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-soc-071811-145511 
54. Muresianu, A. (2018, August 16). Criminal Justice Reform Is Also Good Economics | Alex Muresianu. Fee.org; Foundation for Economic Education. https://fee.org/articles/criminal-justice-reform-is-also-good-economics/ 
55. National Institute of Justice. (2016). Five Things About Deterrence (pp. 1–2). U.S. Department of Justice. https://www.ojp.gov/pdffiles1/nij/247350.pdf 
56. National Research Council. (2014). The Growth of Incarceration in the United States. National Academies Press. https://doi.org/10.17226/18613 
57. Nellis, A. (2024, February 14). How Mandatory Minimums Perpetuate Mass Incarceration and What to Do About It. The Sentencing Project. https://www.sentencingproject.org/fact-sheet/how-mandatory-minimums-perpetuate-mass-incarceration-and-what-to-do-about-it/ 
58. Nellis, A., & Komar, L. (2023, August 22). The First Step Act: Ending Mass Incarceration in Federal Prisons. The Sentencing Project. https://www.sentencingproject.org/policy-brief/the-first-step-act-ending-mass-incarceration-in-federal-prisons/ 
59. Oleson, J. C. (2022). California Law Review.
60. Ortiz, J. M., & Jackey, H. (2019). The System Is Not Broken, It Is Intentional: The Prisoner Reentry Industry as Deliberate Structural Violence. The Prison Journal, 99(4), 484-503. https://doi.org/10.1177/0032885519852090 
61. Peters, R. (2007, March 20). HEARING BEFORE THE SUBCOMMITTEE ON CRIME, TERRORISM, AND HOMELAND SECURITY ( COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, Interviewer) [Interview]. In https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CHRG-110hhrg34176/html/CHRG-110hhrg34176.htm. 
62. Petersilia, J. (2011, November 2). Beyond the Prison Bubble. National Institute of Justice. https://nij.ojp.gov/topics/articles/beyond-prison-bubble 
63. Petrich, D. M., Pratt, T. C., Jonson, C. L., & Cullen, F. T. (2021). Custodial Sanctions and Reoffending: A Meta-Analytic Review. Crime and Justice, 50(1). https://doi.org/10.1086/715100 
64. Pettit, B., & Gutierrez, C. (2019). Mass Incarceration and Racial Inequality. American Journal of Economics and Sociology, 77(3-4), 1153–1182. https://doi.org/10.1111/ajes.12241 
65. Phelps, M. S. (2011). Rehabilitation in the Punitive Era: the Gap between Rhetoric and Reality in U.S. Prison Programs. Law & Society Review, 45(1), 33–68. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-5893.2011.00427 .x
66. Ploch, A. (2012). WHY DIGNITY MATTERS: DIGNITY AND THE RIGHT (OR NOT) TO REHABILITATION FROM INTERNATIONAL AND NATIONAL PERSPECTIVES. New York University of Law. https://nyujilp.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/44-3_Ploch_Web.pdf 
67. Raphael, S., & Stoll, M. (2014). A New Approach to Reducing Incarceration While Maintaining Low Rates of Crime. The Hamilton Project. https://www.hamiltonproject.org/assets/legacy/files/downloads_and_links/v5_THP_RaphaelStoll_DiscPaper.pdf 
68. Rotman, E. (1987). Do Criminal Offenders Have a Constitutional Right to Rehabilitation. Northwestern Pritzker School of Law Scholarly Commons, 77(4). https://scholarlycommons.law.northwestern.edu/jclc/vol77/iss4/2/ 
69. Sawyer, W. (2020). Visualizing the racial disparities in mass. Prison Policy Initiative, 7.
70. Soderlund, K. (2023, September). Dignity Under Confinement – The Center for Values in International Development. Centerforvalues.international. https://centerforvalues.international/dignity-under-confinement/ 
71. Starr, S., & Rehavi, M. (2014). Racial Disparity in Federal Criminal Sentences Part of the Civil Rights and Discrimination Commons, Criminal Law Commons, Law and Race Commons, and the Law and Society Commons Recommended Citation Racial Disparity in Federal Criminal Sentences. M. M. Rehavi, Co-Author. J. Pol. Econ, 122(6), 1320–1354. https://repository.law.umich.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2413&context=articles 
72. The Pew Charitable Trusts. (2017, March 21). State Reforms Reverse Decades of Incarceration Growth. Pew.org. https://www.pewtrusts.org/en/research-and-analysis/issue-briefs/2017/03/state-reforms-reverse-decades-of-incarceration-growth 
73. Travis, J., & Western, B. (2021, April 13). The Era of Punitive Excess | Brennan Center for Justice. Www.brennancenter.org; The Brennan Center for Justice. https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/era-punitive-excess 
74. U.S. Sentencing Commission. (2014). Final Crack Retroactivity Data Report: Fair Sentencing Act. U.S. Sentencing Commission.
75. University, S. C. (2021, March 8). The Impact of Mass Incarceration on Health Outcomes. Www.scu.edu; Santa Clara University. https://www.scu.edu/ethics/healthcare-ethics-blog/the-impact-of-mass-incarceration-on-health-outcomes/ 
76. Vera Staff. (2018). Overwhelming Majority of Americans Support Criminal Justice Reform,…. Vera Institute of Justice. https://www.vera.org/news/overwhelming-majority-of-americans-support-criminal-justice-reform-new-poll-finds 
77. Visher, C., & Eason, J. (2021, April). A better path forward for criminal justice: Changing prisons to help people change. Brookings Institute. https://www.brookings.edu/articles/a-better-path-forward-for-criminal-justice-changing-prisons-to-help-people-change/ 
78. Vitiello, M. (1991). Reconsidering Rehabilitation. McGeorge Law Review. https://scholarlycommons.pacific.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1271&context=facultyarticles 
79. Wakefield, S., & Uggen, C. (2010). Incarceration and Stratification. Annual Review of Sociology, 36(1), 387–406.
80. Walmsley, R. (2018). World Prison Population List twelfth edition Roy Walmsley. In Prison Studies. https://www.prisonstudies.org/sites/default/files/resources/downloads/wppl_12.pdf 
81. Webster, C. M., & Doob, A. (2012). Searching for Sasquatch: Deterrence of Crime Through Sentence Severity. The Oxford Handbook of Sentencing and Corrections. https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199730148.013.0007 
82. Western, B. (2007). The Prison Boom and the Decline of American Citizenship. Society, 44(5). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12115-007-9000-5 
83. Wing, N. (2013, March 20). Senators Introduce Bill To Scale Back Mandatory Minimum Sentencing. HuffPost; The Huffington Post. https://www.huffpost.com/entry/justice-safety-valve-act-senate_n_2918823 
84. Zhang, R., Srinivasan, S., Nnadi, V., Price-Tucker, A., Zhou, A., Charroux, A., Tenzin, C., Robertson, E., Abdalla, H., Gu, J., Barton, J., Keselj, M., Bernstein, O., Alexis, P., Odayappan, S., & Escalante, T. (2019). SUCCESSFUL REENTRY: A COMMUNITY-LEVEL ANALYSIS. Harvard Institute of Politics. https://iop.harvard.edu/sites/default/files/2023-02/IOP_Policy_Program_2019_Reentry_Policy.pdf 
85. Zobel, Z., Ratner, S., & Ostrovsky, A. (2024, March 15). Contributor: Breaking the Cycle—RSAT Program Improving Reentry in Arizona. AJMC; AJMC. https://www.ajmc.com/view/contributor-breaking-the-cycle-rsat-program-improving-reentry-in-arizona 

Zoukis, C. (2014). College for convicts : the case for higher education in American prisons. Mcfarland.